Video Art

For my video art piece, I experimented with many different forms of video and music editing programs. I was inspired by David Hall's piece "This is a TV Receiver" where he recorded a recording of a recording of a... etc.

In my video art, I experimented with layering and I layered a video with a layered video with a layered video... etc. Ultimately the video got a little distorted because with the app I used (Ghost Lens), each video got faded a little, so the final product looked very faded.

Some interesting things to note are the sounds that people make. You can hear that the people repeat themselves more when I added more layers to the film. I also created a calm-sounding track (with Garageband) in the background to make the video have continuity, but not have the music be in the way of the video.

Here is the link

Songs

I found six songs that fit into five different categories on Santiago's website:

The first one being  "Don't You Want Me Baby" The Human League. I think this song fits into the category of House music because there is a bunch of technological sounds like house music has. There are synthesizers and beep sounds and its kind of DJ-ish.

My friend showed me the group CocoRosie a while ago. I think they fit into the industrial/goth category because they are kind of experimental and well as strange. They use children's toys and different sound settings and instruments to make a unique sound. The pair also utilizes their one-of-a-kind voices.

Believe it or not, there are a whole bunch of popular vocaloids in asian pop culture. Besides Hastune Miku, a girl named Meiko is also a fan favorite. She has a bunch of weird songs just like Hatsune Miku, but she seems a little more mature than her. She fits under the virtual category.

Electric Light Orchestra is a band I really like. All of their songs are pretty good. They like to use synthesizers and other technology to create catchy songs. I think they fit into the new wave category because their sound has technological alterations, but not too many.

I found two songs that fit into the post-modern crisis category. They are both kind of modern, but sound a lot alike. The original being Modest Mouse's "Float On" and the new copy being Lupe Fiasco's "The Show Goes On." Even though the two have different lyrics and meaning, they are too similar. Lupe Fiasco's is basically a much faster version with different lyrics. His fits into the post-modern crisis category because he made this song because he could not come up with anything new. I personally like Modest Mouse's version WAY better.

Golan Levin's Interview

I thought Golan Levin’s interview was really interesting. I especially like the way it was presented with the 3D video. That is a cool piece of technology. You can tell where there is depth because the lines get long. The technology has trouble with shadows though; when Levin was using hand gestures and shadows went onto his shirt, the software thought parts of the shadow were his hands. Overall, though, it was really cool how the camera could change perspective so that he appears 3D.

I didn’t understand a lot of what he was talking about because I am not too well versed in computers, but I think the class has definitely made me understand it more. I thought what Levin mentioned about people who get degrees in technology have a disadvantage because once they get out of school, the technology they learned is obsolete. Since I am not a computer programming major, I have never thought of that. I think that is true of most majors, though. For example, I am a biology major and I want to go into medicine after I complete my undergraduate program. Medicine, like technology is always getting better and changing. But even so, I don’t think any learned knowledge is in vain; many new technologies are based on the old ones, so by learning what is relevant now, you could also probably figure out what will be important in the future.

Levin’s interview was really good, and it made me want to learn more about computers and technology so that I know what programs and software he is talking about. Especially since technology is everywhere; it would be beneficial to know what is going on all around.

Buying Digital Art

I found this article called "What Does it Mean to Buy Digital Art?" that I thought was very interesting. It made me wonder about how digital artists get money. Digital art pieces are usually expensive to make because they require technology, yet a person cannot really make any money from it. The article is very cool.

Flower Ceiling

In class, we have talked a lot about museum installations where there is technology that senses where the people are and lights up there or stops raining. Recently, I found a piece of technology that moves flowers around depending on where the person is. The link is here and there is a video that shows how it works. Since it is with flowers, not only does it constantly change visually, but it also smells different too. It looks very pretty.

Performance Art

For my performance art project I went fishing into the International Mall in Tampa, FL. Since the theme of this project is happiness, I thought doing something ridiculous (like fishing indoors) would make people laugh, and it did. Although the video doesn't show it, many people on the lower level were laughing at the sight of me as well.

I also did it to inspire people to have fun outside. There is a finite amount of activities you can do inside, but outside the possibilities are endless. So while people were spending their Saturday afternoons spending their money and being cooped up in an echoing building, hopefully I reminded them of what you can do in the sunny, endless nature of Florida--for free.

I was only able to perform for about ten minutes before the mall cop came and told me that I could not fish in the mall. It was private property and a performance such as mine would distract consumers from shopping and hurt the businesses economically (yeah right, Gucci is going to go out of business because of me).

Anyway, I actually had a lot of fun creating this video and performing. It was very hard not to laugh because many people were also laughing or smiling and making funny comments. I honestly thought I would be much more scared to be acting so crazy in a public place, but it wasn't that bad. I think my disguise (hat and sunglasses) helped, but it probably made me look even more ridiculous.

David Bowie Everywhere in Contemporary TV

Recently in class, we talked about David Bowie's "Life on Mars" appearing on season four of American Horror Story: Freak Show. Apparently, television show producers are all a part of David Bowie's fan-club because that is not the only David Bowie reference made in today's television.

The hit ABC show, Once Upon a Time has a side series called Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. The show is really interesting, with both Aladdin and Alice in Wonderland characters. The classic Alice in Wonderland characters Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum make an appearance as servants to the Red Queen.

The Tweedles both have this make-up on:

It is very similar to David Bowie's "Aladdin Sane" album cover:

It makes me wonder if that is how the producers got the idea to add Aladdin characters. They were probably like, "let's have the Tweedles wear Bowie face paint." "Hey, wouldn't it be cool to have Aladdin characters to further make a tribute to David Bowie?"

It astounds me how everything always leads back to David Bowie somehow. I'll keep my eyes out for more.

Xerox Project - "Self Portrait"

I was inspired by Salvador Dali's skull portraits and Giuseppe Arcimboldo's still life portraits for this project. I thought that since I am using xerox copies of my self, I should decontextualize them and make them something else, just like Dali and Arcimboldo did.

                              
                                                            Guiseppe Arcimboldo

                                               
                                                                  Salvador Dali

I ended up making my project very similar to the Arcimboldo's flower portrait.

                                                                The final product

Here are some close ups:

I decided to use my hair as the background because, as I am blonde, it showed up really well coming from the machine. There was a lot of hair that I cut out and I didn't know what to do with it. I thought I should take up the space of the whole board, so I made it the background.

I used my hands and arms for the clothes because I liked the way my arms could drape around the neck and chest. They also take up a lot of space and as the fingers dangle, I thought it mimicked the furs on a coat.

I used my facial body parts for the neck and face because they were small and could arrange into lines and look cool on top of each other. Big parts would be hard because the face is such a detailed surface. I used my open mouth for a rosy cheek, a side view of my lips for the top lip, and fingers for the nose (with a mouth shadow) and bottom lip. For the eyes, the eyeballs are fingernails and the out line is part of my separated fingers.

For the hair, I used my hands again because I had a lot left over. They also had a good form enough to make a cool spiky 'do.  I xeroxed some of my money that I had just because, and I thought the coins and bills would make good hair accessories.

When I was finished, you could not really tell what was what because there were so many layers, so I had to color it to tell. The coloring didn't work that well because you could see the glue and cardboard texture imprint. Also, I was using Prismacolor Verithin colored pencils and I usually do not like them as much as the regular Prismacolors. I think these make the color too light. The composition is better seen from a close distance because the colors are not super saturated.

Overall, I think I did okay with this project. I think it turned out good, but I planned for better. The arrangement was difficult because I would find the perfect arrangement, but then I had to take it off to glue it down. I wanted some things to overlap so I had to un-glue somethings to make that happen. The cutting was the most laborious tai though. I had around 50 sheets and it took me two days of cutting to get each body part perfectly cut out.

The thing I like about this concept is that each of my body parts has been decontextualized; my hands and arms become a jacket and my eyes, nose, ad mouth become my skin. It is just a cool idea. I also like that even thought this piece does not look like me, it is still a self portrait because it is made of me.

Modern Un Chien Andalou

In class, we looked at the short film "Un Chien Andalou" by Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali. The part where the man is pulling the pianos to show his devotion to a girl (7:50) reminded me of the music video for Bruno Mars' "Grendade." Throughout the music video, Bruno Mars is also pulling a piano, but he is singing about how he will do anything for his girl. Back in 2010, when I first watched this music video, I was really confused by this gesture. I thought it was crazy, like why is he pulling the piano; what's the point of that? Now I realize that it is a reference to Bunuel's short film because Bruno Mars wants to convey the same story--that he loves a girl and will do anything for her, but she does not love him back.

The Velvet Underground

I had not heard of the band The Velvet Underground until Santiago told us about them, however, I have heard some of their songs before. I've heard of the songs "Sunday Morning," "Venus in Furs," and "Heroin." I think I either heard them on the radio or in a movie. I think this band is okay; I like their sound, but a lot of their songs sound the same because the lead singer, I'm assuming Lou Reed, does not have a lot of variation in his voice. They kind of sound like an average indie/ hippie band with their soft guitar, tambourine, and sometimes strange sounds. I am not really that fond of their other songs, but I do enjoy "Sunday Morning" because it is a nice calm song that I do think expresses the feeling of a care-free Sunday morning. It is a nice song to relax to.

Picasso Look-Alike

The other day I went to my one year old cousin's birthday party. The theme was Peppa Pig, who is a children's cartoon character. I thought it was interesting because the characters look a lot like Picasso/ cubism art because each angle of character's face can be seen in a two-dimensional drawing. Both the eyes, the front of the nose, and the full mouth can be seen at once. I just thought it was interesting that this style is used in a kids show.

Stumbling on the Internet

I was looking on thisiscolossal.com a few weeks back and from looking at many forms of art, I somehow stumbled upon the website of Becky and Joe. Becky and Joe do many animations; some are 2D and some are puppets.

I first started watching their short films because of the creepy, yet consequently mesmerizing "Don't Hug Me I'm Scared" series. These animations look innocent and cute at first, with a Sesame St. and playhouse atmosphere, but the plots take a morbid and freaky turn later on. My favorite of the series is the first one, as it seems to kind of make fun of other shorts that teach children to be creative use their imagination. I just crack up at 00:58 every time for some reason.

The real reason I started talking about this website is because of one of their animations, "Tallest Heights" looks a lot like one we saw in class. It is 2D animation that is colorful, busy, and scratchy that plays along to a song created by a guy who goes by Delicate Steve. I do not remember the animation that we saw in class was called, but this looks very similar to what we saw.

Grid on Instagram

A few days ago, I saw the work of an artist whose art looks very similar to our recent grid project.

The artist Eric Daigh used pins to create these gigantic portraits. His technique is very similar to a few students in the class who also used pushpins. His art is incredible and instead of 30 x 30 his are probably 100 x 100 or more!

Grid Project

I decided to do my grid project on "Nighthawks" by Edward Hopper. I was torn between this painting and one of Van Gogh's sunflowers. I chose this one because it reminded me of home. I live very close to Chicago, and I would often go to the Art Institute of Chicago and see this painting on its walls.

                                                                   The final product

This piece also kind of reflects myself because like the people in the painting, I tend to be a nighthawk and stay up past the normal hours of living. In fact, I created most of this grid project after midnight each day over spring break. It took me around three days (at least five hours a day) to complete this.

                                                         My work station

I decided to use hole punched paint samples because I could capture the exquisite colors of the painting with ease, as I did not have to do any cutting. If I had to cut out each unit of the grid, it probably would have taken double the time.

                                        
                                          Close up                                             The grid

The grid is 30 x 54 units, for a total of 1620 punched holes. I had to draw a grid on top of my reference to be more exact. For each square, I picked the most represented color and matched it as best I could with the paint samples. I did not have all the perfect colors, but I tried my best. Some colors I had no match or I ran out of, so I had to make another trip to the hardware store.

                                                                       Comparison

The final product is not a perfect match, but it still looks really cool. The best way to see it is on a slight angle and further away. you could also be a little closer to it and take off your glasses. Overall, it was a really laborious, but fun project. I think I might want to do another. Maybe Van Gogh's sunflowers this time :)

Gaming

I do not consider myself a "gamer," but I love video games! My first portable "video game" ever was a tamagotchi in elementary school. I was so addicted to my digital pet, and I loved feeding and playing games with him to make him happy. I would constantly play until the batteries ran out. Over the years, I kept getting the new additions, so I probably had around three of them.

Before that, I loved to play computer games. There were some that I played from a disk and some online. Some of my favorite games were Pajama Sam, Put-Put Saves the Zoo, Nancy Drew, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. The Nancy Drew game was the one on Shadow Ranch and it was very challenging. I do not think I ever completed it. Harry Potter was my all-time favorite computer game. I loved the movies, and the game was pretty much as awesome. I played it all the time and I completed it thrice.

I soon moved on to Nintendo video games when I got my Nintendo DS. It was my first real video game, as my family did not have a gameboy, gamecube, or xbox. I was also addicted to this. I loved playing Animal Crossing, Nintendogs, Mario Kart, and Super Mario Bros. This is when I discovered Mario and I fell in love. We soon got a Wii and I played all the Mario games. Super Mario Galaxy was my favorite. I also liked the Super Mario Bros. for the Wii, but my siblings and I would always yell and blame each other for dying, so my mom got mad and told us not to play it.

When I was in elementary school, I also had a ton of Webkinz and would always play online. Club Penguin was also a large part of my online life. I actually paid to be a member. I have no idea why; it is really not that fun. I also played a lot of online games on the Disney website. They had games for Zack and Cody, Lizzie McGuire, and other shows I liked. Later on, Disney also came out with Toontown, which I loved to play. I did not want to be a member though, so I played until I cannot get anywhere without being a member.

When my little brother got older, he got an xbox one. I played Forza Horizon, a racing game, with him and enjoyed it, but I don't really play it that often. Now, I do not play video games at all because I brought non with me. I still like them, but they aren't as fun as they used to be.

Spring Dance Concert

On Friday, February 20th, I attended the Spring Dance Concert. It was surprisingly really good. I had no idea that the dancers of UT had such talent. Santiago Echeverry's video dance was in the first performance: Theme and Variation...with a twist. This dance was really cool. It combined older and classic music and dance with a newer feel. The video playing in the back as well as the beat in the background of the music added the "twist" with modern technology and art. The video playing in the back was projected onto the dancers and you could see their gridded "reflection" on them.

The rest of the program was very good. I especially liked the one with the pointed-toe ballet dancers because I haven't seen a ballet in such a long time. I never really saw much of the artistic side of the University of Tampa, but I have to say that after I saw this program, I realized how talented of a school we are.

FLIPITY BOOK

I hope George R. R. Martin does not get mad at me for decontextualizing one of his great works: A Feast For Crows (from the Game of Thrones series.) I love his books, but he can be a little bit murderous in his stories, as he kills off practically everyone. This flip book is a tribute to him.

  I decided to start off with the viewer traveling though space because it looks awesome and it shows a lot of movement. I needed to move the story along, so an abstract green blob hatched from his egg on some distant planet and decided to go on an adventure. He became a rocket and a fish, which our old friend George R. R. Martin, the sadist (as it points out in the end), decided to destroy. When I created this flip book, it was completely random and was the result of no planning, so I guess my mind and subconscious took over. I suppose they were saying that although you could feel free and make anything of yourself, you could die any minute; even more so if your life was in the hands of George R. R. Martin, the sadist. However, I still remain optimistic because alas, all men must die, so one should not always fret over this universal truth. Don't worry, be happy.

Mark J. Stock

I thought Mark Stock's work was really cool. There were a lot of abstract smokey and wavy elements in his work that makes the pieces captivating. One of his videos, called WAVE, was really neat, and it reminded me of the grid projects we have to do. In the video, single colored squares and rectangles fuze into a wave that looks like paint is being mixed.It is similar to the grid project because each unit is one color and is combined with other units to create a greater work of art. The video is almost trippy and is hypnotizing to look at. Being a longer video (13 minutes) it would be perfect as a computer screen saver or on a TV in a fancy waiting room.

The Man Who Was Tomorrow

I remember when I was younger, my dad used to listen to the radio when he went to bed. Sometimes I would creep into his bed at night and listen to it. Twilight Zone was always on at 11 pm. I found it captivating, and in the darkness with the amazing sound effects, I could visualize each scene perfectly. And although at my young age each program would leave me scared and unable to sleep, I thought they were so cool to listen to.

For this class, I listened to the old time radio program, "The Man Who Was Tomorrow." It is a science fiction show that was very similar to Charles Dickens' Cristmas Carol in that a man was shown his future in order to get him to change his ways. In this program, a man broke up with his girlfriend and thought nothing of it but the man who was tomorrow talked to him and showed him that this girl was his future and by being with her he would have an amazing life. The man then got back with her to have a happy life.

I thought this form of entertainment was very cool. There were amazing sound effects that made the "action" seem real even though there were no visuals. The voices were really good too and each actor conveyed the correct emotion very well.

Overall, I thought this was an amazing radio show. I really enjoyed it and I can see why people used to listen to these all the time. You can have your hands and eyes free while having some good entertainment. While reading a book, you have to look at it and use your hands to hold it, and with the TV you have to look at it. However, with radio you can do just about anything and have great entertainment.

Pandora and Spotify

I use both Pandora and Spotify regularly and love and hate them both. I love the aspect of Pandora where I can choose one song or artist and the website creates an ongoing playlists similar songs. I really enjoy how I can stumble upon songs that I have never heard of before but like. I have even made playlists based on new artists that I have discovered from Pandora. It is amazing how the playlists can be even more fine tuned by me "thumbs-up/down-ing" the song.

I use pandora a lot when I want a very specific genre of music. For example, Pandora can create a playlist of just Disney songs or just songs from Les Miserables if I type in a playlist based on Tarzan or the famous musical. I can make it even more specific by typing in a certain performance. I have two Les Miserables playlists; one "Les Miserables (Original London Cast)" and another "Les Miserables (2010 Cast)." Both of these playlists give me music that is mostly from that album. I use Pandora a lot when I am painting or creating an artwork. I love to listen to film score when I paint, so I usually listen to score from How to Train Your Dragon or Lord of the Rings.

I do really love Pandora, but I really don't like how I cannot pick a specific song. In Spotify though, I can. In fact, I can skip around from song to song often. The downside of this is that I need to find a particular playlist that has these songs, but the good side is that you can see all the songs available and choose them. Spotify has many pre-made and good playlists that I like to listen to. I can also choose a playlist based on my mood. I listen to Spotify a lot when I go for runs. I really like the playlist "Songs to Sing in the Shower," which I listen to when I run. It is just a compilation of songs that make you happy and can sing along to.

Modern Lartigue

I was on tumblr today and I saw this picture of Skrillex that was featured in Time magazine.  It reminded me of one of Jacques-Henri Lartigue's jumping photographs that we learned about in class a few weeks ago. It is awesome how Lartigue's style is still utilized today.

While I'm on this subject, Lartigue's photo also reminds me on one of Edward Gorey's works. I hope we talk about him in class. He's one of my favorites!

Honeymooners

I recently watched "The Man From Space," a funny episode from the show Honeymooners. This episode brought back memories of when I was a kid and watching this show with my dad, as it is one of his favorites. It is very interesting watching it now with a different perspective. Although I haven't seen that particular episode before, it is still similar to all the other episodes I have seen.

In this particular episode, the main character, Ralph wants to win best costume at the annual costume party to win money. He and his best-friend-turned-rival, Norton, come up with the same plan of buying a professional costume to win; however, Ralph does not get permission to borrow $10 from his wife to buy a costume so he is forced to make one himself. Using random objects from around the house he creates a garbage costume that only he recognizes as the man from space. At the costume party, his Norton is unable to show because a plumbing emergency calls him to work, so Ralph becomes one of the finalists in the contest. Just as he is about to win best costume as a pin-ball machine, Norton suddenly enters in his work uniform, consisting of a gas mask and rubber pants and boots, and ends up winning best costume as the man from outer space.

This is such a great show because it is filmed in front of a live audience, so there is a genuine "laugh track." The jokes are classic and actually funny; some are even improvised. This show probably inspired many other modern shows because today's comedy TV consists of the same elements: a not-so-smart main character with a feisty wife and a comical best friend. Countless shows use these old ones as reference, as technology changes and brings color and HD to our screens, because the entertainment of the Honeymooners and other classic TV shows is timeless.

How Disney Made Snow White

The video about how Walt Disney made Snow White was very enlightening. I had no idea, nor did I even think about how much work it takes to make an animated movie. I thought it was really cool how the artists used layers to change the scene and move it along and to keep the background scenery and still have characters moving around. This clip made me appreciate animations a lot more. The narrator mentions that there was more than 250,000 slides and it took over .5 million shots to get each scene flowing perfectly. I think everyone just did a splendid job on this movie and it makes me want to watch it again.

I do have to mention that I thought it was hilarious how the narrator was talking about the conditions that the pretty female painters and tracers were working in (comfortable, air conditioned, etc.). I thought that was an unnecessary detail that sounded like one of those farmers that talks about the treatment he gives his livestock! That segment was probably not thought of as rude and sexist at the time, but he just seemed to be looking down on women's jobs.

Le Voyage dans la Lune

The Trip to the Moon (1902) by Georges Melies was excellent! The set design was so good. It was very intricate and detailed, which made the lunar land of Melies so much more enjoyable to see. The background paintings looked very realistic, and some of the set even moved. The mountains on the moon as well as the earth moved down. Also, the editing was excellent. You could tell that the film strips were cut and pasted back together, but it was not a big difference, so it looked natural. It was also really cool how they were able to overlap scenes, for example around 8:10, when they were on the moon, the women on the stars and crescent moons were not on the same film, but they overlapped. My favorite parts were when the lunar travelers returned to earth, they landed in a fish tank! That was really clever to film an underwater scene in a fish tank. Also, you got to love the iconic scene where the moon has a bullet in his eye. Overall, the film was really cute and it look very fun to make. Melies probably really enjoyed making this.

The Great Train Robbery

The Great Train Robbery is a short ten minute film by Edwin Porter in 1903. It is a silent film with no subtitles, but there is music in the background that I think was added a while after the film was made. I thought this mini-movie was interesting because there was not much cinematography; there was no camera movement, only scene change. This made the film seem like the action was on stage like a play.

The makers of the movie colored some of the character's clothes, like the little girl and the dancing women. This might have been added to represent the good people from the bad people. The robbers wore black, while the good women and little girl stood out because they were beautifully colored. Also, some of the explosions were painted, especially the gun shooting. This made the action seem more dramatic because the shots stood out more.

At around 3:10, the guy on the train changed to a mannequin, which I didn't really catch at first, but I knew that he was fake because they threw a limp body off the train. They did a pretty good job editing for that part. I'm pretty sure the original viewers thought it was real.

The viewers in the 1900s probably thought the gun shot at the very end was real too. They must have reacted similar to the short clip of the train in the station, where the viewers thought they were going to get run over by a train.

Compared to modern film, this lacked a lot of action and a good story line, but I'm sure the people of the 1900s really enjoyed it. The makers did a good job with the tools they had.

Die Zauberflote

I watched the opera Die Zauberflote by Mozart which was done really well in a colorful and beautiful way in 2006 at the Salzburg Festival. I decided to watch this opera because the Queen of the Night seemed really cool. I ended up to enjoy this opera very much.

Mozart's music is very nice. I especially love the Queen of the Night's solo, and the bird guy, Papageno's main theme song (which has been stuck in my head for two days now). I thought it was really interesting how the characters had their own theme song, for example, whenever Papageno came on, his little flute music would play. At times, though, the music did get boring. Many times the singer would repeat what s/he said multiple times as well as draw out a sentence for a few minutes. I wanted to tell the singers to get on with it a few times. I think the point of the repetition is to show how much whatever they are saying is in their thoughts, or because it is something really important. It is strange though how a character can sing for 7-10 minutes and say around 5 sentences. In today's musicals and  films a character's thoughts can be conveyed in a 3 minute song or less.

I also liked how this opera was a love story and not a tragedy. I agree with Mozart on his notion that people enjoy watching things with a happy ending. This was a story where two main characters actually found their soul mates.

As much as I enjoyed this opera, I hated it at some parts. Most of the characters were sexist towards woman and thought that only men were strong and brave and woman were just there to look pretty and start a family. Tamino, the main character, had to go on a whole journey just to prove he was manly enough. It just really annoyed me that they made women seem weak and incapable of doing anything, while portrayed men as strong and earning and possessing women. The opera was also racist when there was the only black character (portrayed by a white man and looking like a Black Face) portraying the ugly and unwanted moor that stole the main character Pamina away. I'm fine with a black character, but they made him an ugly villain in this opera.

On the contrary, this opera was excellent because there was a lot of cool technology involved. There were flying birds and an airplane of three boys. There was also a giant monster. At the end, there was a fountain with both water and fire coming out! I was amazed that the fire did not extinguish. The coolest fire part was towards the end when some of the guards had fire coming out of their helmets. It was not fake blowing orange paper either, it was real fire. It looked amazing, and all the fire and flying gave the opera more of a reason to keep watching. Another thing that caught my eye was the costumes. The Queen of the Night had the most beautiful dresses, especially the green one she wore in her solo. I liked Papageno and Papagena's look too. It was interesting how they had messy dreadlocks and raggedy clothes. I thought each character's outfits matched their personality perfectly.

Overall, this opera was really good and entertaining. I didn't think i would enjoy opera, but I am thinking of maybe watching another one sometime because I really enjoyed this one.

Pjotr Sapegin's Madama Butterfly

This video was beautiful. It is a stop-motion animation with the score from the opera Madama Butterfly by Giacommo Puccini. I thought the stop-motion choice was perfect in this short film. If the clip was made with real people, it would look cliche and some of the effects (like how the women and her daughter were flying and the woman taking herself apart) would not be possible. Also, a cartoon or drawing would not be as interesting to look at. This clip is successful because its art is so interesting to look at you cannot take your eyes off of it.

I loved the part when the woman had her baby. There was just a glass sphere for her swollen stomach and then the glass breaks and a fish flows out when she has her baby. I thought that was so cool because it was such a creative idea to show her having a baby through a breaking marble rather than the standard way.

Another one of my favorite parts was at the ending when the woman was so distraught that she took herself apart and became a butterfly. The music and the way she unmade herself conveyed her emotions perfectly because the love of her life and his girlfriend took her daughter away, so all she wanted to do was whither away. The ending was hopeful, though, because she ended up changing into a butterfly.

I think the whole meaning behind this short film is that change can be good, even though it may hurt. Change turned the woman's new-born fish into a wonderful daughter, change made the woman love the man more when she waited for him, and finally, the change of the man's heart compelled the woman to morph into a beautiful butterfly.

Thoughts on Dr. Raul Cuero

I think Dr. Cuero is a very interesting man. He is definitely a good role model and a person that anyone can look up to because he is so well-rounded in his "living smart" lifestyle. He is a microbiologist and inventor, so not only is he smart, but he is also very creative.

Cuero mentions that to live smart one must find satisfaction in one's mental, physical, and spiritual development. I believe this piece of information is important to live by; if a person keeps aiming for great development, then when she/he gets there, she/he will have lived a extraordinary life. In my life, I will assess my progress on a mental, physical, and spiritual level to live happier and healthier. More specifically, I will try to be more intense (as he mention in the interview) with my development mentally, as a student in the classroom, and physically, with working out and my health goals.

I will also take Dr. Cuero's advice and use my phone, computer, and TV less and be outside with nature more often. I agree with his point that the lack of nature and human interaction crushes creative potential; it could not be any more true than with my sister. She is not the most creative or intelligent person and all she does is play on her phone and watch TV. I, personally, am always striving to be greater, so if that means enjoying the nice Tampa weather more often, I will definitely not marathon shows on Netflix all day.

As a biology major, I think Dr. Cuero is an amazing person to learn from because he is so successful and well-rounded. I will certainly take his wise advice and apply it to my everyday life.

Hi!

I'm Samantha Packard, but most people call me Sammi. I am a freshman and a biology major at the University of Tampa. I love science, but art is another one of my passions. Acrylic and oil painting and drawing are some of my favorite forms of art, however, I also dabble in ceramics and jewelry making. In my free time, I enjoy playing tennis and badminton--which, contrary to popular belief, is a legitimate sport and not just a leisurely backyard activity. Another fun-fact about me is that I am trilingual and can speak English, Japanese, and some French (only four years in high school). I also love to travel and have most recently been to Germany and France.

I decided to take Art and Technology because I wanted more of a free-thinking and fun class as an escape from my science-heavy schedule. Based on this first day, I think this class will be just what I need. The professor seems like a very eccentric and intelligent guy that set up the class to be enjoyable as well as full of content that will challenge us students to think and inspire us to create art that I, personally, am not used to creating. Although I was worried that I would not be able to sit through an almost three hour class, I did really enjoy this first day and I am looking forward to expanding my knowledge of art and its relation to technology.